Thursday, February 11, 2010

Formula to predict time for love and marriage revealed

MELBOURNE - Released just in time for Valentine’s Day, a new formula predicts the time for love and marriage.

Brainchild of Australian statisticians, the equation works on how old you are when you start looking for a life partner, and the absolute oldest you want to be to tie the knot, reports News.com.au.

“Applying maths to matters of the heart is always a dangerous prospect. In human life when you’re dealing with emotions you have to think much harder,” University of NSW School of Mathematics and Statistics professor Tony Dooley said. “But if you want to work out the right moment to start getting serious, this actually gives you a mathematical framework to think about it.”

The university’s statisticians claim a success rate of almost 40 per cent.

“Romance by the numbers

1 Choose the oldest age by which you want to get married, for example, 39. Call this ‘n’.

2 Decide the earliest age at which you’ll start to consider a potential spouse, for example, 20. This age becomes ‘p’.

3 Subtract ‘p’ from ‘n’ (39 - 20), then multiply the result by 0.368. This equals 6.992.

4 Add this to your minimum age.

Result: 27 is your optimal proposal age.” (ANI)

Militants indulge in extortion in Meghalaya

Shillong, Feb 11 (PTI) Suspected tribal militants are reportedly indulging in rampant extortion in mining and forested areas of Meghalaya where a tribal chief was kidnapped last month.

Suspected militants of the nascent Garo National Liberation Army had allegedly kidnapped 58-year-old Chongrin Marak, one of the richest Nokmas (chief of clan) in Garo hills, on January 11, police sources said.

They indicated that the militants had demanded Rs one crore for his release.

Militants of GNLA and Liberation Achik Elite Force (LAEF) have served a number of demand notes in the coal-mine and forested areas of South Garo Hills, East Garo Hills and parts of West Khasi Hills in last few weeks, the sources said.

"We have seized a number of such demand notes. Most of them were signed by the finance secretary of LAEF," South Garo Hills SP Anurag Kumar told PTI over phone.